The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea

A farcically misconceived attempt to transplant Yukio Mishima's engagingly perverse novel to an English setting, and to make its peculiarly Japanese psychology and motivations work with a set of improbable Anglo-American characters. The two main strands of plot (genteel but sex-starved widow falls for sailor who's ready to quit the sea; teenage son gets hooked on the Dangerous Ideas of the school bully and his gang) remain obstinately unrelated, and both swing wildly between inept naturalism and half-assed melodrama; the whole thing is shot like a cross between a travelogue and a substandard '50s weepie. Writer-director Carlino first castrates the book by betraying both its tone and its meaning, but then tries to compensate by introducing bits of would-be nastiness (an exploding seagull!) and scenes of would-be daring (Miles and Kristofferson discreetly nude). The result is more depressing than amusing, an insult to any audience.